It’s hard to say who’s more relieved the Washington Wizards season ends at Boston on Wednesday.
Interim coach Ed Tapscott can stop working with players that can’t call a simple timeout after expressly telling them to do so in yet another loss on Monday.
Caron Butler and Antawn Jamison can quit carrying more baggage than an airport skycap.
Fans can start thinking about next season when a new coach, healthy roster and hopefully a high first-round pick can recharge the Wiz from their worst season in Washington to a serious playoff contender again.
“Lots of positives, lots of negatives,” Tapscott said. “We’ve taken some steps forward. We’ve taken some steps backwards at times.”
Tapscott couldn’t say “it was the best of times” because this was simply the worst of times. Early injuries to Gilbert Arenas and Brendan Haywood gutted any chance of a good season.
Tapscott must be relieved to hand over the whistle. His frustration leaked out after Monday’s 97-96 loss to Toronto in the home finale. The Wiz blew another game in a 19-62 season with two dumb turnovers in the final minute, including not calling a timeout after he told them to in the previous huddle. At least a fan sank a three-pointer during the timeout to give everyone pizza.
“Brain damage,” said Tapscott in disgust. “Brain lock. We made about every error you could make.”
Where do the Wiz go from here? The new coach must rebuild Arenas into Agent Zero once more. Spend the summer working the offense to feature the former All-Star and pray the knee doesn’t go bad again.
Haywood, Arenas, Butler and Jamison are a solid foursome and maybe the first-rounder can fit in well. The rest of the roster can be jettisoned. Nick Young, Andray Blache, Olesky Pecherov, Darius Songalia, Juan Dixon and Etan Thomas haven’t proven to be anything.
Blow up the bench because they’ll never help this team substantially. JaVale McGee is the only one worth keeping. Find role players who will support rather than subtract.
Meanwhile, watch the team’s informal summer workouts. They’ll show whether the Wiz will rebound next fall.
“We’re trying to work on the chemistry. Try to get that flow into the summer,” Butler said. “The guys being injured so long, we just want to play through the summer, play pickup and keep the thing going all the way through to training camp.”
Rick Snider has covered local sports since 1978. Read more at TheRickSniderReport.com or e-mail [email protected].
